"GUMMER on warpath...", "Grim plea...", "Big bang strategy...", "Act now...". This is how John Gummer, the environment secretary, hit the nation's headlines in a big way last month. On 17 July, he warned his ministerial counterparts from other countries of the dire consequences of doing nothing about climate change.

The occasion was the meeting of signatories to the Climate Change Convention in Geneva. And Gummer was totally justified in "going overboard" by claiming, as he did, that millions of people would be faced with drought and desertification even in countries as close as Spain and southern France.

The situation we face is a potentially perilous one. Having read Fred Pearce's scene-setter for Geneva, "Carbon targets up in the air" (This Week, 6 July, p 9), I asked Gummer the Americans and Australians at the convention were genuine about their targets for carbon dioxide emissions.

He replied that the Americans ...

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